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October 27, 2014

Ice Cream Icon Jerry Greenfield 2014 Volpe Lecture Speaker

Why Med School Rejections Were Great For Ice Cream Lovers

St. Francis College welcomed ice cream icon Jerry Greenfield, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's Homemade, Inc. as the 2014 Thomas J. Volpe Lecture Series speaker on October 27, 2014.

Watch the story from SFCTV

Born in Brooklyn, Greenfield returned to the Borough, bringing with him 1,000 Cherry Garcia and Half Baked ice cream bars for An Afternoon of Entrepreneurial Spirit, Social Responsibility and Radical Business Philosophy.

jerry greenfield

Greenfield shared that the inspiration for Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream came after he had been rejected by about 20 medical schools and Ben was in the middle of a failing streak on multiple business endeavors.

When they opened their first store in Vermont they mixed their ideas of entrepreneurship with socially conscience ethics and showed that just as in the Franciscan tradition, you can be successful by doing the right thing.

jerry greenfield with sfc today

The lecture series is funded through a generous gift from Thomas J. Volpe, Chairman Emeritus of the St. Francis College Board of Trustees and a former Senior Vice President of Financial Operations for The Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc..

Guest speakers offer an international perspective in a variety of fields; from business leaders to world leaders. Past speakers include astrophysicists Neil deGrasse Tyson (Cosmos), authors Frank Bruni (New York Times), Pete Hamill (Snow in August), E.L. Doctorow (Ragtime) and Salman Rushdie (Midnight's Children), Russell Simmons (Def Jam), Mariane Pearl (wife of slain reporter Daniel Pearl), Paul Rusesabagina (the real Hotel Rwanda hero), Lech Walesa (former President of Poland, Nobel Prize winner) and George Mitchell (former U.S. Senator, Nobel Peace Prize nominee, baseball steroids report).

St. Francis College, founded in 1859 by the Franciscan Brothers of Brooklyn, is located in Brooklyn Heights, N.Y. Since its founding, the College has pursued its Franciscan mission to provide an affordable, high-quality education to students from New York City's five boroughs and beyond.

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St. Francis College, 180 Remsen Street, Brooklyn Heights, NY 11201
www.sfc.edu

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